Deborah Meier is a visionary teacher, author, and founder of successful small schools in New York City and Boston. Harry Boyte, senior scholar at Augsburg College, is founder of the youth civic empowerment initiative Public Achievement and a leader in the movement to democratize higher education.

the SAT, the ACT, the end-of-course exams, the AP exams, and graduation exams, the NAEP tests don't matter. And seniors know it. They doodle on their test papers, or they select answers with a pattern, like all B, or all C, or ABCD/ABCD.

Once again, a small elite has come to a "consensus" long before there has been any national debate. In the interests of our commitment to schools that foster democracy, how can we do a better job of including "the people" in the conversation?

"In short, what concerns us, Diane, is not new, but part of some ancient issues that reappear over and over. Ted Sizer used to say that he wanted his own kids in schools where he could look the decisionmakers in the eye and personally expect an answer, other than "I had to do it. THEY made me."...

My favorite line from that day occurred when Jackson said he had recently visited some very high-performing nations. At each stop, he asked authorities: "What do you do about bad teachers?" They consistently replied: "We help them."

We're all entitled to "our opinions," but schooling should take us beyond "mere" opinions into tentative conclusions that once again are held with care. Will this approach lead to dilemmas? Yes, yes, yes.

Diane Ravitch writes: "Somehow our old disputes about whole language, bilingual education, and the new new math pale in comparison to the coordinated assault by powerful forces on the very foundations of public education."